Communications devices such as cellular telephones, mobile communication devices, personal digital assistants (PDAs), laptops, and the like are becoming more prevalent as technology advances and makes these devices more powerful and more affordable. These devices are also being constructed with increasing capabilities and can now perform functions that have in the past been performed by dedicated special function communications devices. For instance, a common mobile communications device today may have computing capabilities that allow the device to process multimedia content, the ability to communicate with data networks such as the Internet, a display than can render high quality still images and video, audio capabilities that allow the device to play music and video soundtracks, as well as the ability to place and receive traditional mobile telephone calls and text messages.
The expanding capabilities of mobile communications devices have allowed the improvement and enhancement of more traditional technologies. For example, voicemail has traditionally been an audio-only feature that requires a telephone connection to a voicemail server. Traditionally, a user would receive a message waiting notification that a voicemail is available, and the user would then have to dial into a voicemail server to listen to the message. Thanks to technological advances, visual voicemail is available on many mobile communications devices. Visual voicemail presents a visual interface to a user's voicemail box and allows the user to view attributes of voicemail and manipulate voicemail in various ways that were previously not possible. A user may delete or save voicemail through the visual interface without having to place a telephone call to a voicemail server. A user may also be able to see who the voicemail is from, when it was sent or received, and other characteristic of the voicemail without actually placing a telephone call to a voicemail server. Visual voicemail systems may also provide a means for a sender to include multimedia content to accompany a voice message or to be provided instead of a voice message.
Current visual voicemail services are typically implemented by requesting and establishing a session between a user device and a device in a wireless provider network to obtain visual voicemail data on a user's device. Then, to obtain any additional content, such as a video or song, a text message, or any other multimedia content, a separate session must be established between a user's device and the appropriate server or system. For example, as shown in FIG. 1, user's 110 device 111 may establish a communications session over network 101 with voicemail server 133 and download visual voicemail data upon receiving a notification of a new available voicemail. This may be accomplished through the use of visual voicemail client 113 configured on device 111. When viewed in light of the Open System Interconnection Reference Model (“OSI Model”) communication between visual voicemail client 113 and a device in a wireless provider network may occur at the application layer using a communications session established at the transport layer, such as a transmission control protocol (TCP) session. For example, a packet data protocol (PDP) context may be activated for device 111 via communications session 152 between operating system 112 of device 111 and radio network controller (RNC) 132. This establishes communications configurations, such as an Internet protocol (IP) address, tunnel identifications, etc., that may be necessary or desired in order to set up a data communications session. PDP contexts may be established on a variety of network devices, including an RNC. Such devices may be configured or capable of maintaining a limited number of PDP contexts, and may be capable of establishing a limited number of PDP context in a set period of time.
Once a PDP context is established, data communications session 153, which may be a TCP session, may be established between a voicemail application running on device 111, such as visual voicemail client 113 and a network device, such as voicemail server 133. Once session 153 is established, voicemail server 133 may communicate with a device 111 and specifically with visual voicemail client 153 at the application layer and transmit voicemail data to visual voicemail client 153. Such data may include an indication that multimedia content associated with a voicemail is available. Communications session 153 that had been used for communicating voicemail data is then terminated, and in some instances the PDP context may be deactivated. In order to obtain or otherwise receive the multimedia content, device 111 must then set up another communications session with a appropriate device, such as a content server or a messaging server, and may also have to reestablish a PDP context. For example, in order to access a text message associated with a voicemail, messaging client 114 may be activated on device 111 and establish communications session 154 with messaging server 134. Messaging client 114 can then download, request, or otherwise obtain the associated message from messaging server 134. Similarly, if there is multimedia content associated with a voicemail, in order to access such content, content retrieval client 115 may be activated on device 111 and establish communications session 155 with content server 135. Content retrieval client 114 can then download, request, or otherwise obtain the associated multimedia content from content server 135. Once messages, multimedia content, or other data associated with a voicemail is obtained, such data may be presented to a user on device 111.
There are several drawbacks to the current methods of providing data or content associated with a visual voicemail. By requiring separate communications sessions, utilizing visual voicemail systems may be unnecessarily resource intensive. Establishing separate sessions to obtain associated content may result in the repeated reestablishment of PDP contexts, wasting resources on an RNC or other device configured to establish and maintain PDP contexts. It may also result in setting up several separate communications sessions in order to obtain data or content for a single voicemail. This results in unnecessary utilization of network, mobile device, and server resources. The user experience may also be affected, as the user may be required to interface with several different applications on a device just to obtain the content associated with a single voicemail.